Crimean War

Crimean War
Part of the Ottoman wars in Europe and the Russo-Turkish Wars
Attack on the Malakoff, by William Simpson
Date 16 October 1853 – 30 March 1856 (1853-10-16 – 1856-03-30) (2 years, 5 months and 2 weeks) Location Crimea, North Caucasus, Balkans, Black Sea, Baltic Sea, White Sea, Far East Result Allied victory Territorial changes Russia loses the Danube Delta and Southern Bessarabia
Belligerents
Ottoman Empire  France[a]  United Kingdom[a] Sardinia[b]	Russia  Greece[c]
Commanders and leaders
Abdulmejid I Omar Pasha Napoléon III J. L. de Saint-Arnaud George Hamilton-Gordon Lord Palmerston FitzRoy Somerset Alfonso La Marmora	Nicholas I Alexander II Prince Menshikov Prince Gorchakov Prince Paskevich Prince Vorontsov Nikolay Muravyov Pavel Nakhimov †
Strength
Total: 673,900 235,568[1] 309,268[2] 97,864[2] 21,000[2]	Total: 889,000[2]–1,774,872[3] 888,000 mobilised 324,478 deployed
Casualties and losses
Total: 165,363 dead 45,770 combat deaths 119,593 non-combat deaths 45,400 dead[2] 20,900 combat deaths 24,500 non-combat deaths 95,615 dead[2] 20,240 combat deaths 75,375 non-combat deaths 22,182 dead[2] 4,602 combat deaths 17,580 non-combat deaths 2,166 dead[2] 28 combat deaths 2,138 non-combat deaths (Clodfelter) Total: 517,000 dead[4] 400,000 dead 95,000 dead 22,000 dead (Tashlykov)	Total: 450,015 dead[5][2][6] 73,125 combat deaths 376,890 non-combat deaths Total: 113,529 dead 40,551 combat deaths 88,798 non-combat death 81,247 wounded[7] (Russian medical Directorate) Total: 522,000 dead[4] (Tashlykov) Dumas & Vedel-Petersen:[8] Total: 630,000 dead according to Chenu Total: 73,125 dead 35,671 combat deaths 37,454 non-combat deaths (Sep. 1854 – Oct. 1855)
Casualties include death by disease. In all cases, death by disease exceeded the sum of "killed in action" or "died of wounds".

The Crimean War^[d] was fought between the Russian Empire and an alliance of the Ottoman Empire, the Second French Empire, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont from October 1853 to February 1856.^[9] Geopolitical causes of the war included the "Eastern question" (the decline of the Ottoman Empire, the "sick man of Europe"), expansion of Imperial Russia in the preceding Russo-Turkish wars, and the British and French preference to preserve the Ottoman Empire to maintain the balance of power in the Concert of Europe.

The flashpoint was a dispute between France and Russia over the rights of Catholic and Orthodox minorities in Palestine.^[10] After the Sublime Porte refused Tsar Nicholas I's demand that the Empire's Orthodox subjects were to be placed under his protection, Russian troops occupied the Danubian Principalities in July 1853. The Ottomans declared war on Russia in October^[11] and halted the Russian advance at Silistria. Fearing the growth of Russian influence and compelled by public outrage over the annihilation of the Ottoman squadron at Sinop, Britain and France joined the war on the Ottoman side in March 1854.^[9]

In September 1854, after extended preparations, allied forces landed in Crimea in an attempt to capture Russia's main naval base in the Black Sea, Sevastopol. They scored an early victory at the Battle of the Alma. The Russians counterattacked in late October in what became the Battle of Balaclava and were repulsed, and a second counterattack at Inkerman ended in a stalemate. The front settled into the eleven-month-long Siege of Sevastopol, involving brutal conditions for troops on both sides. Smaller military actions took place in the Caucasus (1853–1855), the White Sea (July–August 1854) and the North Pacific (1854–1855). The Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont entered on the allies' side in 1855.

Sevastopol ultimately fell following a renewed French assault on the Malakoff redoubt in September 1855. Isolated and facing a bleak prospect of invasion by the West if the war continued, Russia sued for peace in March 1856. Due to the conflict's domestic unpopularity, France and Britain welcomed the development. The Treaty of Paris, signed on 30 March 1856, ended the war. It forbade Russia to base warships in the Black Sea. The Ottoman vassal states of Wallachia and Moldavia became largely independent. Christians in the Ottoman Empire gained a degree of official equality, and the Orthodox Church regained control of the Christian churches in dispute.^[12]

The Crimean War was one of the first conflicts in which military forces used modern technologies such as explosive naval shells, railways and telegraphs.^[13] It was also one of the first to be documented extensively in written reports and in photographs. The war quickly symbolized logistical, medical and tactical failures and mismanagement. The reaction in Britain led to a demand for the professionalization of medicine, most famously achieved by Florence Nightingale, who gained worldwide attention for pioneering modern nursing while she treated the wounded.

The Crimean War also marked a turning point for the Russian Empire. It weakened the Imperial Russian Army, drained the treasury and undermined its influence in Europe. The humiliating defeat forced Russia's educated elites to identify the country's fundamental problems. It became a catalyst for reforms of Russia's social institutions, including the emancipation reform of 1861 which abolished serfdom in Russia, and overhauls in the justice system, local self-government, education and military service.

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